State Sen. Stacey Campfield may have wanted to create a splash Monday afternoon when he announced a fundraiser with Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey, but he didn't wind up getting the attention he intended.

Campfield, a Knoxville Republican and black sheep of the GOP delegation, blasted out an email message shortly before 4 p.m. Central touting an Oct. 22 event in Nashville. What should have been the most noteworthy element was the fact that Ramsey, the Senate leader, had agreed to be the event's co-host, implicitly signaling that Campfield remains in the Republican fold despite his cantankerous ways.

But there was just a little problem with the email: Campfield sent it from his legislative account, an apparent violation of state campaign finance law.

That misstep might seem minor, but around the Tennessee Capitol, using official resources for fundraising is not taken lightly. And the mistake came just a week after Campfield's aide was fired for working in Knoxville when he was supposed to be in Nashville, a violation of statehouse rules.

Campfield owned up to the mistake quickly. Thirteen minutes after his original message went out, he sent a follow-up message asking recipients, "Please disregard the previous email. It went out on my wrong account."

But with Campfield, controversies are rarely resolved tidily.

After word of the email snafu went around, the owner of DeSano Pizza Bakery, where the fundraiser was to take place, complained that no one at the restaurant knew anything about it until irate customers called to say they wouldn't eat at his place if he let it go forward.

"I'd never heard of the guy in my life," said Scott DeSano, who lives in Florida. "Then they (the staff in Nashville) started getting all these calls this morning. Some of them made my staff a little uncomfortable."

DeSano said he refuses all requests to rent out his restaurant, which seats about 120 people. The restaurant isn't configured to allow people to rent out a portion of the restaurant, he added.

"We get all kinds of people that want to close the place for the night," he said. "It's no for all of them. We just want people to come in and order pizza."

Campfield responded that, although he hasn't been involved in making arrangements, he thought he had permission to cordon off a portion of the restaurant. But he agreed to look for another location.

The former Teach For America executive, who dabbled as a guest columnist for the Washington Post during those days, chose to highlight Gov. Bill Haslam's new goal of making Tennessee the nation's fastest-improving state in teacher pay, as well as progress in high school-level national assessments.

Additional bloggers include members of the department's communications team.

Huffman, at the helm since 2011, has been under scrutiny this year for his aggressive education reforms. Most recently, a group of nearly 60 Tennessee superintendents signed a letter last month questioning his leadership.

The commissioner has sought to deflect criticism by pointing to improvements on TCAP tests, among other signs of progress. A department-run blog gives him a forum to make that case.

In his blog post, he points to recently released state-level PLAN and EXPLORE test results, which are taken by eighth- and 10th-grade students, respectively, and are aligned with the ACT.

He says Tennessee has moved ahead of the national average.

- Joey Garrison

Knoxville lawyer weighs run for Senate

Terry Adams, a Knoxville lawyer, appears to be testing the water to run as a Democrat for United States Senate.

In an email to Democrats statewide on Thursday, Adams introduced himself as the son of a Nashville songwriter and filling station worker. He added that he has served in the Navy Reserves and funded his education on the Montgomery GI bill.

"A number of people around the state believe that my profile ? is a good fit for this race," he told The Tennessean.

Anderson told the Shelbyville Times-Gazette last week that he will run as a Republican against U.S. Rep. Scott DesJarlais and state Sen. Jim Tracy. He said he doesn't like cities but nonetheless hopes to go to Washington for one term to "start this revolution."